After yesterday´s devastating penalty given to Vettel I didn´t know what to expect from the race. I was overwhelmed with all different kinds of thoughts going through my mind varying from worst case scenarios to more positive ones. The Yas Marina Circuit seemed to be the venue with extreme emotions! Back in 2010 I was overwhelmed with joy when Sebastian secured his first world title under the artificial lights of Abu Dhabi. This year seemed to be quite the opposite. I knew Sebastian would be able to turn the pit-lane start into a decent points finish but in my wildest imagination I thought 6th would be about the maximum outcome he could get. At this stage I have to say how much I admired Sebastian´s positive attitude! In spite of all the setbacks he seemed so calm and said that there´re possibilities to get something positive out of the situation. He also quoted the famous Finnish ski jumper Matti Nykänen saying that "Every chance is an opportunity." No wonder that things tend to work out for Seb, an attitude like this is highly admirable!
What an absolutely eventful and epic race we saw today on Yas Island! Kimi´s start from P4 was legendary. He managed to overtake both Maldonado and Webber and was right in tail of Hamilton who maintained his lead. Vettel started to the race from the pit lane but he snatched positions one by one making his way through the field. Vettel´s front wing got minor damage at the beginning of the race when it was hit by Senna´s rear tyre but the German decided to stay out. He had jumped up to 13th place when something happened. On lap 10 HRT´s Karthikeyan had a steering failure in his car and he braked suddenly which lead to Rosberg crashing into the HRT. Nico´s Mercedes flew over Karthikeyan´s car and ended up to the wall. It was a horrendous looking accident. Luckily either one of the drivers didn´t get hurt! But there was so much debris on the track that safety car was deployed.
Vettel experienced another dramatic moment when driving behind the safety car. Toro Rosso´s Ricciardo braked suddenly in the straight line and Vettel evaded to the right and crashed in to the DRS sign on the track which caused some more damage to his front wing. On lap 14 he pitted for a set of sof tyres and a new nose. After the pit stop he was back in P19 and he had to make his way through the field once again...!
Hamilton had built up a few seconds´ gap over Kimi but all of a sudden Hamilton´s race was over! The Briton had a technical failure on lap 20 when the fuel pressures suddenly dropped and he had to retire the race. The Iceman took the lead and his pace was remarkable indeed! Once again we got to hear some legendary messages over the team radio. Kimi was told on the team radio that Alonso was 2nd 5 seconds behind the Lotus driver. Kimi answered by saying: "Leave me alone! I know what I´m doing!" You just gotta love Kimi for his comments! And the Iceman definitely knew what he was doing in the dark night of Abu Dhabi!
There was another safety car episode a little later in the race. On lap 39 there were four drivers fighting for positions: Grosjean, Perez, Webber and Hulkenberg. Grosjean and Perez ended up colliding with each other and Webber ended up crashing to Grosjean´s Lotus. The race was over for both Webber and Grosjean. The stewards decided that Perez was responsible for causing the collision and the Mexican was handed a 10- second stop and go penalty. At this stage Kimi had built up an almost 10-second gap to Alonso but lost the advantage due to the safety car episode. The safety car was good news to Vettel in P4 who was over 20 seconds behind Button in 3rd place because of his second pit stop. Behind the safety car Kimi was told to work all four tyres of his car to keep the temperature up and we heard another epic comment from the Iceman: "Yes, yes, yes, yes. I´m doing all of that. Stop telling me!"
After the second restart Kimi drove a couple of staggering laps and managed to build up a few seconds´ gap to his closest rival Alonso. Vettel in P4 instead was right behind Button but overtaking the Briton wasn´t that easy. Finally Sebastian managed to squeeze his car past the McLaren driver and he was on his way to the podium after all! Alonso managed to decrease the gap into a second but he never got a chance to try to overtake Kimi who took his first win of the season! Absolutely magificent job from Kimi, finally Lotus got their victory! I didn´t know which I was happier about, Kimi´s win or Sebastian making it to the podium! I have to say that both drivers exceeded my expectations today! And positive surprises, they´re just wonderful! I was almost touched when watching Kimi and Sebastian on the podium. And their awesome comments when interviewed by David Coulthard... There definitely is some magic about the Yas Marina Circuit! What an entertaining show it was! I have to admit watching the GP on my home coach involved some serious screaming and jumping around today!
So what looked like a disaster turned out to be a success! Who could have thought in the wildest dreams after hearing about Vettel´s penalty yesterday that Alonso was still going to be 10 points behind Sebastian in the WDC standings after the chequered flag in Abu Dhabi? That´s amazing, utterly unbelievable! Now I truly believe that when it´s Sebastian Vettel in question, anything is possible! Only the sky is the limit. I should have followed Sebastian´s example yesterday. I mean I definitely didn´t know how to calm down. This shows that it really matters if you believe you are capable of miracles! It was so touching to see Sebastian standing on the podium. I can almost imagine how absolutely fantastic he must have felt after such an outstanding performance! To turn such difficulties into such a success is a miracle indeed. Sebastian was near losing his temper after the incident with Ricciardo but luckily he managed to keep his head cool and the rest is history! The amount of self-confidence that you get from a race like this must be incomprehensible. This could well mean that the highly talented German Red Bull driver is on his way towards his third world title!
Two weeks to go before the inaugural Austin GP... This excitement is killing me! ;)
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